


Growing Up Michael

by NomadicSurvivor



Series: Michael Guerin Week Series [6]
Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Canonical Child Abuse, Child Neglect, F/M, Foster Care, Gen, M/M, Michael Guerin Week 2019, POV Michael Guerin, Past Child Abuse, Sexual Abuse, Touch-Starved, guerinweek19, mgweek19
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-22
Updated: 2019-09-22
Packaged: 2020-10-25 20:35:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20730377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NomadicSurvivor/pseuds/NomadicSurvivor
Summary: There’s a lot of my life, my story, my experience on this god-forsaken planet that I don’t share with people.  Don’t share with Max or Isobel.  Part of me says its because I don’t want their pity (which is true), and part of me says its because they just won’t be able to understand after growing up an Evans (which is also true).  But I think a lot of it is because it’s mine – my story, my experiences, my history and life.  When you spend most of your life at the mercy of everyone around you, with practically nothing to call your own, you keep what you can.  Is part of it shame?  Maybe a bit.  But it’s mine.  Whether it’s a happy or sad memory, a good or bad experience, a point of pleasure or pain, they are mine, and no one can take them from me.  And at a certain point, sharing any of it feels like giving those things away – and too much has been taken away from me for me to just give something away.  (We won’t even get into how this might be a major point in all the issues between Alex and I as this is where we are exactly the same)





	1. Day One to Alburquerque

**Author's Note:**

> I had started writing this before Michael Guerin Week was announced. So this is actually my first fanfic in over 20 years. I was supposed to be writing a letter to my 16 year old street kid self as an exercise with my therapist, this is what came out instead… I’ll eventually get that Note To Self finished as well, but it comes out so much harder than writing this. The MG Week posted and I saw this and went – Hey! Pre-canon!
> 
> It’s also not finished yet, a couple more chapters to go. It may or may not continue through the decade from high school to start of series or not, we will see where it leads

There’s a lot of my life, my story, my experience on this god-forsaken planet that I don’t share with people. Don’t share with Max or Isobel. Part of me says its because I don’t want their pity (which is true), and part of me says its because they just won’t be able to understand after growing up an Evans (which is also true). But I think a lot of it is because it’s mine – my story, my experiences, my history and life. When you spend most of your life at the mercy of everyone around you, with practically nothing to call your own, you keep what you can. Is part of it shame? Maybe a bit. But it’s mine. Whether it’s a happy or sad memory, a good or bad experience, a point of pleasure or pain, they are mine, and no one can take them from me. And at a certain point, sharing any of it feels like giving those things away – and too much has been taken away from me for me to just give something away. (We won’t even get into how this might be a major point in all the issues between Alex and I as this is where we are exactly the same)

I don’t remember coming out of the pod, I don’t remember who came out in what order. I remember a hand reaching for me. I remember hesitating, not sure, but then taking it as another slipped into my other hand. I remember the warm sand around my feet and the stars above as the three of us walked. I remember bright lights from something big and loud approaching us on a road. I remember the orphanage the three of us were taken to, where so many other small children were making so much noise. We didn’t speak, but we knew what the other was saying, thinking. The cacophony of noise - screaming, talking, laughing, crying voices, school bells, scraping of chairs and tables or desks on floors, creaking of windows and doors, slamming of those same doors – it was so much noise after so long in blissful silence. And then you add all the sights – the lights, sunshine, colours, patterns, pictures on walls. Other children bumping into you, adults grabbing you to move you or stop you. The feeling of ill-fitting clothes over bodies that had been naked in the pods for so long – it was all so much. The other two kids seemed to adjust faster, but for me, it was just overwhelming sensation of every sort and I didn’t know how to handle it. And what I knew from before… I don’t know what it was, where or when, but there was stuff in my head that I just knew, and when I started getting it out of my head, the noise in my head got a little bit quieter. The overwhelming world we suddenly found ourselves in was a bit less harsh on my senses. So between rocking in a corner and drawing on walls, paper, the floor, whatever I could get ink onto, the everything of this planet, in my head, got a bit easier. Sadly that’s not how the grabby, loud adults around me viewed it.

I remember when the Evanses came and took the other two away from me. The boy looked confused and sad, I could feel and hear him asking me why I wasn’t coming with him. The girl looked and sounded conflicted – she liked the smiling lady in the bright sweater, but somehow knew better than the boy that they didn’t want me, didn’t chose me. She started crying. I tried to chase after them but one of those stupid, grabby grown-ups stopped me. I panicked. A chair moved. Before any of the adults could register the moving of the chair, I kicked it and it broke. No one noticed the stuff on the table nearby that also fell off and broke on the ground. I barely noticed any of the telekinetic activity. It didn’t matter. Suddenly my head was filled with all the noise, all the sensations of this planet, and all the knowledge of before, but what was suddenly louder was the silence where the other two had been. I remember collapsing on the floor and just rocking, crying. Alone. I remember alone.

I remember hearing the grown-ups talk about how my muteness was a problem. My drawing weird symbols was a problem. My rocking was a problem. My anger was a problem. I was a “problem case” they “wouldn’t be able to place”. I didn’t understand what that meant. I understood alone, and I understood how I was different from the other kids. I stopped drawing on the walls and floors. Instead I filled notebooks, because at least they couldn’t see that. Then this other grown-up came and took me from the orphanage. At first I thought maybe she would take me to where the other two went. So I went with her without struggling. But she didn’t feel the same as the Evanses felt when they came to take my family away. She wasn’t grabby like the grown-ups in the orphanage, but she wasn’t warm like the lady in the bright sweater. Still alone.

I rode in her car for a long time. Out the window I watched sand and rocks. Sand and rocks like what we walked through. But not the same. The longer I watched sand and rocks pass us quickly, that quiet in my head got quieter – the silence was louder. And I could feel this pull the other direction, like we were going the wrong way. But I couldn’t say anything. When she finally stopped the car and I got out in front of a run down house, my head was filled with noise and yet the silence was deafening, and the pull was gone – I felt empty.

The meth heads were mentally together enough to know that I had to go to school or the lady would come back. They were not mentally together enough to know that I was hungry and not on their drugs, so while they were on Cloud 9, my stomach felt as empty as my heart. I quickly learned what the white crystals were and what they meant to these strangers I found myself living with. The good part of going to school, even though I was alone, were all the new symbols written on walls and in books. They quickly made sense to me – letters, numbers, shapes. This new knowledge dulled some of the noise in my head, but as I learned and understood more, just created a new noise instead. Words quickly started to have meaning – I knew what people had said to me before, but I understood more. I quickly learned what “freak”, “weirdo”, “foster kid”, “smelly” meant in and above the literal meaning of the words. I learned how emotions are attached to words, how words can be weapons. I would come home angry, alone. I didn’t have any friends, no one to talk to. Not that it mattered since I didn’t talk. My foster parents, Stacy and Kevin, were so wasted most of the time, I could do what I wanted. In my anger I’d throw things with my telekinesis, but it also meant I quickly learned how to partially control it without realizing what I was doing – I threw things where I wanted them to, and could squash down the urge for things to move when I needed to. I learned control very quickly. And most of the time, it worked. I didn’t know this was something not everyone could do, and since Stacy and Kevin were too high to really notice, it didn’t occur to me that I shouldn’t be open with my tk.

The other good thing about going to school when you’re a foster kid, you get free lunch. It was something else for kids to make fun of me over, but lots of days it was the only meal I got, so I ate it. I learned quickly to pocket the apple, sneak another off some other student’s tray when they weren’t looking. Apples were hardy – they didn’t get smooshed in your bag or pocket, and if you kept them hidden for a few days they didn’t go off and get smelly. There wasn’t a lot of food in the house, so this became a lifeline for me. I did start to figure out that my telekinesis was not normal, and when one girl saw something move on its own one time, cried to the teacher that there was a ghost. I didn’t know what a ghost was, but I quickly learned to try to keep my tk in check and not let it move things when people could see.

Stacy was lazy when she was high – she’d just lay on the couch staring at nothing with this weird smile on her face, content. For hours until she passed out. Kevin was different. When he would take meth, he’d be a motormouth (another word I learned at school) and talk so fast it was hard to follow. But then this look would come across his face and he’d change. He’d start talking about how worthless I was, how no one wanted me. No one wanted me so much, that the orphanage didn’t even want me. It’s why I was a foster kid. I was worth a check to them. A check that would buy them more drugs. These lines were fed to me more often than dinner. Sometimes he’d chase me around the house when he was really wired, when he mixed the meth with alcohol – he’d try to hit me but could never catch me. One time he caught me, I learned what a slap was. I learned the difference between an open handed slap and a closed fisted punch. Then I got away. He kept yelling for ages afterwards about how much of a baby I was, how unlovable I was. I became more familiar with the feeling of anger and the feeling of loneliness.

At school, I had a teacher who taught me reading and numbers. I was writing on a paper one day – a mix of letters and symbols from before. She asked me about the symbols. I said “They are from home”. This startled the teacher – according to her, I hadn’t talked in the 14 months since I was found in the desert, nine of which I had been at that school. I don’t know why I started talking, or why I hadn’t up to that point, I just didn’t before, and then I did. What I didn’t realize then, now that teacher paid attention. I didn’t know if that was good or bad. I’d soon learn the answer was both.

A couple weeks later, I came to school and I was all itchy. Kevin’s friend had been visiting, was staying on the couch. He smelled even worse than Kevin and Stacy did, and was scratching a lot. He was all sunburned and his clothes fit worse than mine did. Sometimes him and Stacy would make weird noises in the bedroom when Kevin was passed out on the couch. I didn’t know what they were doing to make those weird noises. A couple days after that, we were all itchy. When my teacher saw me scratching my head, she sent me to the nurse’s office. They asked me questions about when my clothes got washed, when I took a bath. When they asked me to take my shirt off so they could do a “lice check”, they seemed very worried and started asking me about what I was eating, how much and often. The lady from the car months ago turned up at school a little bit later, and I never went back to Kevin and Stacy. The school nurse shaved my head in the office, and they used this shampoo that stung on my head. Then the lady, my case worker, took me to a Walmart and bought me five shirts and two pairs of jeans, then she took me to McDonalds. The McDonalds made me sick. She said something about needing to ease back into foods, whatever that meant. Then she put me in her car again and drove a while – not as long as the first time. She got me out of the car along with the shopping bag from Walmart and took me to a new house. I didn’t know what I had done wrong to be taken away to this new place.


	2. Santa Fe or Bust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Placements in Santa Fe at least shows you the library and the discovery of acetone

Chuck and Kim lived in Santa Fe. They didn’t do drugs like Stacy and Kevin, but each of them drank more alcohol than I ever saw Kevin drink. I quickly learned the value of that almighty beverage to Chuck and Kim. It was summer vacation, which meant no school for a while. I would wander around the neighborhood during the day, and soon after would be wandering around after the sun went down as well. Chuck would go to work in the morning, and would come home in the evening clutching a six pack, anywhere from 1-3 cans already gone from the rings. After his beers, he’d switch to tequila. Kim was a vodka and gin fan. She worked in the afternoons and nights. This meant only overnight would both of them be home at the same time. Kim would be hungover in the mornings, but she would also like to “cuddle”. She’d come into the room they put me in, and would lie down on the mattress that was on the floor in the corner, trapping me against the wall. She’d wrap her arms around me, and breathe on me with the worst smelling breathe I have ever smelt. She would stroke my shaved head, said the buzzed hair tickled her hands. The longer this went on into the summer, the more of my body her hands would stroke. It was weird and I didn’t like it. She’d eventually fall asleep, and I’d slip out of her arms and sneak out the door. I would stay away from the house until I knew she went to work. I still didn’t have any friends so I would wander around by myself, kicking rocks or moving things with my tk. But none of that helped with the anger growing inside me, the shame I felt at being unwanted, or the sadness of being completely alone. If I was too angry, my tk would explode out of me, and I found it made less of a noticeable scene if I was outside where you didn’t notice where the rock was before I moved it.

I’d make sure I was home when Chuck got home – he didn’t want me “being a hoodlum out there all day” – whatever that meant. I quickly learned to gauge his mood based on how many beers had been drunk when he came home and how many were still on the rings. If he only had one, it was safe to stick around a bit, ease my way into my room without causing a scene or angering him. If he had three, I was stuck in the living room with him while he shouted how messed up the world was, how much he was the victim, and how much I wasn’t helping, but hurting, the entire situation. I figured out that grown-up men were more angry than even I was, they were scary, thought I was worthless, all of them knew that no one wanted me, and if they were really mad, thought I was the best target for their anger. While Kevin was mostly all talk, Chuck was more an action guy. He liked punches better than slaps. He also liked to shake you til you saw stars. His “punishments” he would dole out when you messed up, or he was just really angry, ranged from being hit with a belt to being burned with a cigarette. The burns hurt the worst. If you cried, he’d throw you to the ground and kick you, “giving you something to cry about” until you stopped. Those were the hardest times to keep my tk in check. Sometimes something would move, but usually Chuck was too drunk and angry, too focused on hurting me, to notice. Chuck was smart though – he punched and kicked where you could cover it with clothes. If he grabbed too hard on my arms to shake me, or burn me with his cigarette, I’d just wear a hoodie or sweatshirt until the marks went away. No one asked why I was wearing long sleeves in New Mexico summer. No one cared enough to notice.

In my wanderings, I discovered a building people called a library. Here, I found my sanctuary. No matter where I was placed, there was always a public library. I would get lost in the rows of books. I found books on stars and suddenly, hazy memories of before slammed into me as I flipped the pages, looking at satellite photos of nebulas, constellations, the arms of the Milky Way. I read anything and everything I could about space. It would quiet the constant noise in my head for a bit, give me something to focus on. This was my first “summer vacation” – being groped and pawed in the mornings by a hungover woman with puke breath, reading the day away in the library, going home to sometimes dinner and often shouting verbal abuse with a good amount of physical abuse to go with it, then running into the streets, to the edge of town where the desert started to take back over, feeling the cooling night air on my searing skin, refusing to cry. Hoping that the other two from before were out there somewhere and hadn’t forgotten me, wondering if we’d ever see each other again. I hoped they were ok – since all of my experience with adult humans so far wasn’t exactly a positive one, I assumed they were having a similar experience, even though Mrs. Evans felt lighter than the other women I had met. As the defensive walls of survival built up around me, the words of Chuck and Kevin were slowly tearing down my self-image (not that I had much of one to begin with). I was unlovable, unwanted, alone. But I was also angry, stubborn, and refused to let Chuck or any asshole win. And with books in the library, I knew home was out there somewhere. I just had to remember how to get back there.

\--

There was one time I was in the living room scribbling symbols and numbers in a notebook. Kim had left nail polish and remover on the coffee table. I remember the polish was this ugly bubble gum pink color, Kim thought it was “flirty” – I thought it was dumb and for a little girl more than an adult woman. Chuck had come home and went to put his open beer on the coffee table. It was his fourth. He set it down right on the edge, but missed most of the table, and the beer fell to the floor. He shouted that I had knocked it over and backhanded me so hard I fell off the couch and onto the floor. He shoved the coffee table aside to haul me up and shake me, demanding that I replace his beer. I tried hard to not cry, and after a shake that made my head spin, he threw me to the ground and stormed out of the house to go buy more beer. I kept my head down, face buried into the carpet until I knew he was gone and I was safe. That’s when I smelled this smell. When he shoved the coffee table out of the way, the nail polish remover has fallen to the floor, the lid not on all the way, causing it to spill into the carpet. My face had landed in the wet puddle of it. My face was wet in the nail polish remover, and when I licked down to my chin, this small buzz took over my body, things growing into sharp focus as I looked around. There was still a small bit in the bottle, and I hesitantly raised the bottle to my lips and took a small swig. Suddenly the pain in my head went away, and everything went from super-sharp focus to a bit hazy. I suddenly felt how Stacy looked as she rode a high, how Chuck and Kim looked when they were drunk. But the pain in my head was gone. Where I had been kicked felt dulled. I crept into the bathroom and found another bottle of nail polish remover under the sink. I hid it in my room. I had a new secret. But like my tk, I felt like I had a new super power of sorts. I knew no one could find out.

When school started back up, I was again the new kid. My hair had grown back a good amount, so it was shaggy and all over the place. Free lunches continued to be a thing at my new school, as were all the names of “freak”, “weirdo”, “foster trash”, and I was still alone. I was still angry. Inside my head was still so loud. Occasionally I’d be so angry my tk would slip. But I learned that if that happened, you immediately make a bigger scene close by, distract, draw attention away. It’s amazing how stupid people can be when caught off guard. They forget the tk display, focus on the angry child. Yet never ask why the child is angry. With school and new lessons during the day, Kim continued to come into my room at night with new lessons too. I learned what a hand job was. I learned how Kim liked me to squeeze her breasts while she stroked my penis. I didn’t like either, but I also was quickly learning that no one on this planet cared what I liked or thought. I was unlovable, unwanted. I was a play thing for adults to touch or hit, yell at, the value of a check each month being what I was good for. But I also knew the value of a secret. I knew I was different, and couldn’t tell anyone. And when the first school found out about Stacy and Kevin, about whatever I did wrong, I got sent someplace worse. If my case worker found out about Kim or Chuck, or if I messed up again, where would I end up then?

Turns out sometimes life takes care of some questions for you. There was a night where Kim was too day drunk to get to her shift at work. When school let out, I would go to the library, making sure to be home before Chuck got home. When I walked in, I was surprised to see Kim semi-passed out on the couch. She reached for me, a whiny “Mikey, come ‘ere! Give me a cuddle!” filling my ears as her nails dug into my arm, pulling me onto the couch with her. I hated when she called me Mikey. Right at that moment, Chuck came through the door, three cans missing from the rings. Trouble. To say he lost it would be an understatement. First he started yelling at Kim, saying she couldn’t do that with a nine year old, they’d get in trouble and the checks would stop. Then he turned to me and started screaming like it was my fault (which wasn’t hard for me to believe given the mindfuck they had been doing on me in addition to what had been said to me by Kevin and Stacy). He backhanded me and I fell to the floor, tasting blood from my split lip. Chuck quickly took advantage of my fall and kicked me in the back. Kim screamed and begged Chuck to stop. He told her to go fuck herself, and she ran from the house crying. He chased her out, throwing a beer can at her car as she swerved out onto the road and screeched away – in the daylight where a neighbor saw. My caseworker later told me that neighbor called the cops who pulled Kim over a short distance away where she blew more than twice over the legal limit. When the police came to investigate the domestic disturbance call, they saw my split lip and put me in the back of their squad car until my caseworker came to take me. I was terrified. How could things get worse? But again, I knew the value of a secret, so I refused to answer any of their questions about Chuck and Kim. I was a wall. I was tough. I was a survivor. I let my anger show so my fear wouldn’t. Chuck and Kevin got more upset with me when they thought I was afraid – I couldn’t trust the police to not think the same thing. But somehow I still messed up, was still taken away.

My caseworker took me to a group home for a bit before the next placement in Santa Fe. There was an older woman, Alma, along with a couple other foster kids. She met us at the door and kept my caseworker and me on the porch while all the paperwork was done. Then she ushered me into the house as my caseworker’s car pulled away. There were locks on all the cupboards in the kitchen – I didn’t understand that until the other kids in the home told me about how they were only allowed what she served for dinner. You had to ask permission to use the bathroom. You had to show that you had clean hands and combed hair before going to school. She knew how to make sure CPS stayed away from her. But other than that, she ignored us. After the last two placements, being ignored was a blessing. But I couldn’t go to the library after school for the first while with her. Alma didn’t trust me – I was a problem case. But after a couple months, she ignored me as much as everyone else (except in the mornings when she’d complain that my hair was too unruly, not believing that I had combed it no matter what I did). It was easy then to go to the library, just for a shorter time after school before heading back. The other kids in the home called me weird, couldn’t understand why I read so much. “You freak, no one gives a shit if a foster kid is smart or not, no one will want you anyway.” Every day I felt a little less hope of finding home, seeing the other two kids again, finding a place to belong. I was afraid that even if I found the two others again, they wouldn’t want a screw up like me, they’d leave me behind. Even Alma stopped caring about my hair in the mornings. I was just invisible. But at least I wasn’t being hit or touched. Still, the anger in my wouldn’t go away. Sometimes my tk would slip, but when you’re neglected and invisible, no one even noticed that.

This placement lasted until I was about eleven. It was one of the longest placements I had had so far. I was undernourished, short for my age (which I always found weird for case workers to say since we didn’t really come out with a birth date or age stamped on our foreheads), and pale for a kid growing up in the sun of New Mexico. One of the girls in the home, Mariana, passed out at school one day. She had come home with lip gloss on that a friend gave her and Alma freaked. For a woman who didn’t pay any attention to us 99% of the time, it was weird that lip gloss was what suddenly took focus for her. Mariana had been denied dinner for the past two nights. We weren’t given breakfast, and it turns out free lunches stopped after elementary school, so the kids in middle school only got one meal a day at dinner. Mariana hadn’t eaten in three days when she passed out at school. CPS came to see the rest of us after school. Because Alma didn’t know they were coming, and Mariana had told them about the food and everything, there wasn’t time for Alma to remove the locks in the kitchen. We were all rounded up and put in a van and taken to an urgent care where doctors took weights and did physicals on all of us. I was more terrified than when the police turned up at Chuck’s. I didn’t know how I was different, just that I was. I was afraid of the doctor and the physical. What if they found out how different I was?! The doctors prodded heads, joints, skin, looked at our teeth, CPS took pictures of us. But no one checked any of us on the inside with machines, so my fear calmed just a bit. It was still very uncomfortable. I flinched every time one of the doctors tried to touch me. Since coming to Alma’s over a year ago, no one had touched me. Before that touch was either physical abuse or Kim’s “cuddling”. The doctors seemed to pick up on my fear of touch, asked more questions I refused to answer. Someone who called themselves a “therapist” came and sat with me, asking all kinds of questions. I refused to talk and just got more and more angry. Were they trying to make me mess up again and be taken away?! My caseworker and the doctor got into an argument in the hallway. The doctor was yelling about a lack of records where obvious abuse had occurred. The therapist was agreeing. My caseworker was pulled out of the building by another CPS person. The doctor tried to ask me more questions and I just glared and stayed silent. In the end it didn’t matter. I still messed up. I was still about to be punished.

We were taken back to Alma’s to collect our belongings, and then put in different cars to go to new placements. A new caseworker came for me. This one was a guy. I didn’t trust him. I didn’t trust any adult, but so far my experience with men had been much worse than with women. He seemed to sense my trepidation with him, he held the car door open for me, but never touched me. We started driving south, for what felt like a long time. I fell asleep for a bit. When I woke up, the stars were out. Something in the pit of my stomach was coming alive. I couldn’t tell what it was, but it felt familiar. It was something I hadn’t felt in almost four years. I had almost forgotten that feeling. I looked out the window at a desert that looked like the rest of the desert, yet felt different. I shoved the feeling of hope down, afraid of what that feeling could mean. This planet hadn’t been kind to me so far. Nothing good happened to me, I didn’t know what to do with the feeling of hope.


	3. Back to Roswell

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Fundamental Religious Freaks, but at least Micheal is reunited with Max and Isobel

We eventually pulled up to a stark home in Roswell. My caseworker knocked on the door and introduced me to the serious looking man and woman who answered the door. “He’s very small” seemed to come out of the woman’s mouth more than anything else. My caseworker explained that I was a bit undernourished, and the man said they would fill my stomach as well as my soul. I wasn’t sure what my soul was, or what that had to do with hopefully getting more than one meal a day. Once my caseworker left, the woman tried to put her hands on my shoulders to usher me into their house. I flinched away from her touch. The man shook his head, “this one is clearly filled with sin”. I didn’t know what that meant either. I stepped out of her reach, picked up the garbage bag with my clothes in it, and followed them into the house.

Mr. and Mrs. Anderson had a lot of rules at this group home. You had to be awake really early in the morning, joining them in the living room for morning sermon. Aside from the 3 other kids living at the group home, there was a girl living with them, Sophia. She said no matter what, you didn’t want to fall asleep in the morning sermon and make sure you looked like you were paying attention. If you didn’t Mr. Anderson would take a wooden spoon and you had to hold your hands out for him to whack with the spoon. I experienced that once early on and made sure to pay attention to morning sermon after that as often as I could. After school you had to come straight home, and before dinner there was another sermon. We had to take turns reading from their family bible. But at least here there was food. And a real bed in a bedroom, even if I did share it with two other boys. Mrs. Anderson didn’t touch me. If anything it was like she was afraid of me and avoided me. Mr. Anderson would “test my soul” after dinner. Sometimes I had to stand in the middle of the room holding the bible out in front of me. He’d whack the back of my legs with a stick or belt if my arms started to drop down, saying it was a sin to drop the bible. Other times they would make me sit in a straight back chair, not letting me sleep all night, so that the devil couldn’t find me in my dreams. It was obnoxious and I grew more angry. It was getting harder to keep my tk in check with them. But mostly they left me alone, it was all the rules that were harder to follow. I at least got a new sweatshirt from them.

After two weeks, they decided I was ready to go to school. I remember walking into the building and feeling something. It was like that familiar feeling in my stomach as we drove to Roswell. I didn’t know I was finally back where we had started that night in the desert. The something I felt was in my chest, and my head started to fill with very faint voices, feelings. It was prickling at my memories. But it had been years with the roaring silence in my head, I didn’t know what to do with the lack of that silence and the new voices tickling the edges of my brain. I was in a classroom all morning, feeling something I couldn’t place. When lunch came, I went for my state-provided lunch and went straight to the back corner of the lunch room to sit in peace, lunch being the constant at school no matter where I was living. I hadn’t sat down for a minute when the feeling in my head got a bit stronger. I looked up and around the room. That’s when I saw them. We hadn’t seen each other since the orphanage, and they were bigger, but I just knew it was them. They were looking right at me, and the girl was the first to move, striding right over to me as I stood up. The boy followed shortly behind. We all just stopped and stared at each other. She looked me up and down, “It’s you! You came back!” and he smiled. I hadn’t had someone smile at me in years. I wasn’t sure I knew how to smile myself. 

I looked at both of them, “You are both here. I didn’t think I’d see you again.”

The girl then stepped forward and threw her arms around me in a hug. I flinched and stiffened, not sure what to do. The boy saw the flash of fear in my eyes, smiled, and then slowly wrapped his arms around me too. I stood there, frozen, not sure what to do. A teacher came by at that time and asked what was going on. The girl kept an arm around my shoulder and glared at the teacher with a look I would learn meant not to mess with her. “He’s our brother, thank you very much.”

The teacher looked a bit taken aback, then walked away as the girl released her hold on me and sat down at the table, the boy following. I stayed frozen for a moment before shaking my head and sitting down.

“I’m Isobel, and this is Max. What did they call you?”

“Michael.”

Max took a look around before addressing me, “Where have you been? Where did they take you? Why haven’t you been with us all this time?”

I shrugged, trying to appear tough, “I was placed up north, first in Albuquerque, then in Santa Fe in a couple places. But they were all assholes so-“

Isobel gasped “You can’t say that!” while Max looked confused “What do you mean a couple places?”

I looked at them confused while they looked at me confused.

“Wait, how many places have you two lived?”

Isobel looked at Max, “Just at our house with our parents. What kind of a question is that?”

I stared between the two of them, “You have parents?”

Max scoffed, “Don’t you?”

“No, I’ve had foster parents, but not parents. And all of them have been assholes so far.”

Isobel gasped again, “Michael! Don’t let the teachers hear you say that word, you’ll get in trouble!”

Max cocked an eye brow, “What are foster parents?”

We fell into an uncomfortable silence as we picked at our lunches. I was confused, had they not been moving around? They were both dressed in clean clothes that fit them, that looked like all the other students. Max’s hair looked like it had a hair cut recently, not shaggy like mine. They had lunches in plastic lunch boxes, cookies and juice inside. They sat with shoulders brushing each other, neither flinching at the contact. I could see Max examining me the same way – my shaggy hair, my gaunt face, my stretched out collar on my stained t-shirt, the fading scrape on my arm, the school lunch. I looked down and avoided eye contract while I finished eating.

The bell rang ending lunch, and we started to get up. Max put his hand on my arm to stop my movement away from them and I almost dropped my lunch tray as I flinched and pulled out of his grasp.

“Michael, can you come home with us after school? We can talk safely then about everything, find out where you’ve been.”

I shook my head, “I don’t know. My foster par—the people I’m living with right now, are really strict. They have lots of rules at the group home and I don’t want to get a punishment.”  
Isobel looked sad and Max got a worried look on his face, one I’d see for way too often when he would look at me through life.

“Well maybe you can ask them about tomorrow then. If we ask our parents the day before, they never say no.”

I shrugged and said I’d try. We went three different ways towards different classrooms. I could feel their presence fading a bit, but still there. It was a feeling I never thought I’d feel again.

After school I got on a bus and saw Max and Isobel getting into a car – they stopped and looked right at me, Isobel smiling and waving at me. I felt a small smile on my face.

When I got back to the Andersons, I asked Sophia how I could get permission to see my brother and sister after school the next day. She laughed saying she knew I was a problem case if I was placed separate from them while they were placed together. She saw my face fall and took pity on me, telling me to offer to help with dinner, and to volunteer to read from the bible to show I was keen. Then to ask to go to the library after school the next day, but to not mention meeting anyone. She said the Andersons had even more rules about “socializing”. Then she laughed again at how pathetic I was, and walked off to her room to start her homework. As much as Sophia angered me, she did give good advice, and after helping make the mashed potatoes and reading a lot of the bible that evening, I was given permission to go to the library after school the next day. Mrs. Anderson even bought me a new shirt to go with the new sweatshirt.

It was the longest day of school of my life, and even though we sat together at lunch, I couldn’t wait for the final bell at the end of the day. Lunch had been awkward and quiet – no one knew what to ask, and it was almost like we all knew we couldn’t talk openly and honestly in a place with so many ears. Max, Isobel and I met after school and practically ran to a park near their house. We settled at the top of the playground where we could see if anyone was coming, but hidden enough that we felt we could speak freely.

“So what are foster parents?” Isobel didn’t have patience even then.

Max lightly hit her arm, “Izzy, its rude to ask that.”

“Why is it rude to ask that?! He said he has foster parents, and I don’t know what that is!”

I interrupted them, “Why don’t you have foster parents? Where did you go when they took you from the orphanage?”

Max picked at his shoe laces, “Our parents, they came and adopted us from the orphanage and took us home. We’ve been there ever since.”

“What’s adopted?”

Isobel leaned forward, “Mom said it means it was when they decided to make us their children, and they became our parents, and we are a family. And we have a forever home.”

I stuttered a breath. “F-forever home?”

Cue another awkward pause.

Keeping my head down, staring at the ground, I tentatively asked, “What’s your home like?” Somehow I had a feeling they had a very different experience than me, and I had a sinking feeling in my stomach that my secrets were staying mine. Even after finding them, I felt like I was still going to be alone.

Max shrugged, “Like a normal home? I don’t know. It’s just our home. We have our bedrooms, and everything else that’s in a home…”

Isobel seemed to pick up on my discomfort, “Michael, how many homes have you had?”

“Aside from the orphanage or the odd couple days in group homes between placements? This one is my fourth placement, but it’s a group home, not a foster home.”

Based on the blank stares on their faces, I used a lot of terms they clearly had never heard.

“What’s a group home? And a placement?”

“Well, um the group homes are a bit like the orphanage I guess, except you don’t stay at them as long. And there’s usually more than three kids. And placements are the… when you get foster parents and get taken to a new house with fewer kids, my caseworker calls them placements.”

Isobel scrunched her nose, “What’s a caseworker?”

I shrug, “This person who is supposed to supervise you and make sure the placement is a good fit or something. I don’t know, what they tell you they do and what they actually do are very different things. They are mostly useless and turn up when it’s too late to be of any use and just drive you to the next placement. But they get you McDonalds when they do that, so that’s always cool I guess.”

Max looks wide eyed, ”Our parents never let us have McDonalds!” Isobel nods in agreement, then gets serious again.

“How come your clothes are so old? Don’t your par – I mean foster parents – take you back to school shopping? Or at least for a hair cut? Your hair is wild and sticking up all over!”

Max hits Isobel again, “Izzy stop making fun of his hair!”

I try to press my hair down and look down at my clothes, “No one takes me shopping. Usually one of the other kids gives you the clothes they grew out of, or you take some from the bins when you’re at a group home between placements. When I got lice my caseworker took me for new clothes once, but I outgrew them.”

Isobel shuffled back a bit, “Ew! You got lice? I don’t want lice!”

I could feel my face get red and anger rising, “I don’t have lice now, that was a couple years ago.”

Max could see how uncomfortable I was getting, it was like he could feel my anger growing.

“Never mind all that Isobel. We have more important things to talk about. Michael, what do you remember from before the orphanage?”

Isobel immediately scooted forward again and nodded, “Yeah what do you remember? I remember the glow of the light and taking your hand, and I remember us walking through the sand.”

I nodded, “Yeah and all the stars. I remember these lit up things in a room with us.”

Max nodded, “I remember those things too!” Then he grew serious again. “Does anyone know you’re different? Have you told anyone?”

I shook my head, “No, no one. I just knew it was a secret that I couldn’t tell anyone. What about you two?”

Isobel shook her head, “We haven’t told anyone, not even our parents. When we first went home with them, after we started talking, they kept asking us about what happened before we were found on the road. But we just said we couldn’t remember. They made us talk to someone, a therapist, but we just said we couldn’t remember. The therapist and our parents kept asking us if bad things had happened but we didn’t know what that meant so we just kept saying no, and that we couldn’t remember.”

To hear they didn’t know what adults meant by asking if bad things happened…. They hadn’t had bad things happen. They had no idea about the bad things on this planet.

“Can you move things with your mind?”

Both looked startled, “What?!” “Move things with your mind?!”

I smirked, “Yeah, you know, like a super power. Don’t you have the super power of moving things?” 

They both shook their head.

“I sometimes will talk to people in their sleep, or if I concentrate real hard, I can talk to them that way when we are awake too. But it hurts, makes my stomach hurt afterwards. And Max sometimes makes the lights blow up when he gets really mad. But he’s only done that once.” Max blushed and looked down. I felt a little bad for him.

“Well, check this out.” I looked around to make sure no one else was at the park still, and then looked down towards Isobel’s lunch box lying next to her. It started to float up and hover between the three of us. Max and Isobel froze, jaws dropped, and watched the lunchbox hover, then move to the other side of Max.

“Michael, that is so cool!” Isobel looked like she was ready to start bouncing in her excitement. She reached out and lightly pushed me. I flinched and the lunchbox dropped suddenly. I scooted back and flashed a glare towards her.

“Don’t push me!” My anger swelled inside and the lunchbox that had dropped slid and hit the side of the play structure we were in. Max and Isobel looked scared.

“Mi-Michael, I’m sorry! I didn’t push you that hard, it was a friendly push.” Isobel looked like she was about to start crying.

Max leaned forward towards me while wrapping his arm around Isobel. “Michael, what’s wrong? You didn’t like us touching you yesterday too. Isobel is always pushing me around, it’s playing, like a hug. Are you ok?”

I could feel my face turning red with shame, not sure what went wrong, how I messed up again. I just knew I had. Now they were scared of me. I finally found them again and now I messed up. They would leave or I’d be taken away, alone again. I was scared and angry.

“I gotta go. The Andersons get mad if you’re late and miss their stupid sermon.” I scrambled to my feet, and climbed out of the play structure and across the gravel, away from the park.

“Michael, wait!” Max tried to run after me but couldn’t catch me.

I ran back to the Andersons, trying not to slam the door. Luckily I just made it on time. I tried to calm my breathing. I didn’t want them finding out I wasn’t at the library, or seeing me upset and asking questions.

“Michael, come into the living room, it’s time to pray.”

That night I laid awake in bed thinking over our conversation at the park. They had a home. They had a family, each other. I really was unlovable, really was alone. It was unfair. They had new clothes, packed lunches, parents. They hadn’t been hit, screamed at, touched and pawed over. What was so wrong with me that I didn’t get any of that? Why didn’t I matter enough compared to them? And yet, as my anger towards them built, I also felt relief. They didn’t know what went bump in the night. They didn’t know pain. They didn’t know hunger, or being unwanted. That innocent look on Isobel’s face, suddenly I felt this deep wanting, this urge, I wanted to make sure that look never left her face, that she never learned the bad side of this planet. I felt this new sensation inside of me – I somehow knew I would sacrifice everything for them.

The next day I dreaded lunch, was embarrassed and a little scared to see the Evans at lunch. But they came striding towards me, clearly ready to talk about whatever gave Isobel that determined look on her face.

“Michael, I’m sorry I pushed you yesterday. I didn’t mean to get into your…” she looked up, trying to find words, “personal space.” She nodded, pleased she had remembered the phrase.

I looked confused. “Wait, why are you apologizing to me? I’m the one who got mad and ran off.”

Max shook his head. “We went home afterwards and asked our dad about foster parents. He explained to us the difference between foster… um, foster…”

“Foster care?” I asked.

“Yeah, foster care. He explained the difference between that and adoption. And then Izzy told him about pushing you, and your not liking her hugging you yesterday and-“

“You told your parents about me?!”

Max held up a hand, “No, we just said we met you and you had foster parents and we weren’t sure what it meant. So he explained it. Then Izzy said she tried to hug you because you’re our brother. It was weird, my mom got upset and left the dinner table. But then our dad said that before you hug or touch people, especially people you just met-“

Isobel interrupted Max, “Even if we think you’re our brother-“

Max continued, “Right, our dad said you have to ask permission. That people have their ‘personal space’ and you can’t just invade it… or something.”

Isobel nodded, “Then he said I should apologize for invading your personal space, and to ask permission to hug you next time.”

I sat there stunned for a moment. Then ever so quietly, “You told your dad I was your brother?”

Max and Isobel looked confused for a moment, then Isobel rolled her eyes, “Well duh! I mean, you came out of the… things when we did, and we were all found together. So if Max is my brother because of that, then you’re our brother too! And while you feel different in my head than Max does, not as strong, I feel you and I don’t feel other people, so it seems obvious.” 

She shrugged like this was the most blasé, obvious statement to make. Max nodded in agreement, clearly also not phased by this line of thinking. I, on the other hand, couldn’t wrap my head around the idea of being a brother. I didn’t have a family, a home. No one wanted me, I was taken away all the time, unloved.

Max leaned forward, “So can you come over to our house after school?”

I shook my head, both to get the confusion of “brother” out of my head and to answer him. “I don’t think so, I didn’t ask permission to go to the library like I did yesterday.”

“The library?”

I nodded, “Yeah, the Andersons are really strict, and Sophia, one of the other foster kid who lives there, said they are really picky about who she can ‘socialize’ with, so instead of asking to hang out with you two, she said to ask to go to the library. It worked though, so…”

The bell rang, ending lunch, cutting the conversation short. We headed off in our different directions. After school, I went straight home. About 30 minutes later, the doorbell rang. All of the kids in the home were doing our homework at the dining room table (another of the rules), and Mrs. Anderson answered the door, revealing Max and Isobel. I sat frozen in shock, slight fear of what might happen. Then I saw Isobel turn on her sweetest smile.

“Good afternoon Mrs. Anderson, my name is Isobel Evans, this is my twin brother, Maxwell. Our parents are Ann and Philip Evans. We are classmates with Michael.”

Mrs. Anderson clearly knew who their parents were, you could see her relax a bit. “Good afternoon children. Pleased to meet you, can I help you two with something?”

They both nodded, Isobel smiling again, “Yes please, we were hoping you would give your permission for Michael to come to our house tomorrow after school.”

Maxed then took a small step forward, “And since it’s Friday, I was hoping he could stay over for a sleepover… If that is ok with you and Mr. Anderson.”

I was as surprised by this interaction as Mrs. Anderson was. She seemed to not be sure. “Well, I’ll have to discuss it with my husband.”

Isobel once again took charge of the conversation, “Of course. Here is our phone number in case you wanted to speak with our parents. My mom always likes to talk to the other parents to make sure everything is ok when I go sleep over at a friend’s house. She says it’s important to know we are socializing with the right kind of friends.”

I almost choked at Isobel’s choice of words. Clearly, though, she knew what she was doing. Mrs. Anderson took the paper with their number on it and smiled. “Your parents sound very smart young lady. I’ll discuss it with my husband and we will make a decision. In the meantime, Michael has homework to do before evening prayer and dinner.”

Everyone said goodbye to each other and the door was closed. Strangely enough, I wasn’t involved in a single part of this entire interaction, something Sophia immediately picked up on. Mrs. Anderson went back into the kitchen.

“Man, Michael, if that is your sister, you need to take some serious lessons in pulling a fast one on adults from her! She just gave a master class!”

I smiled and finished my homework.

The Andersons allowed me to go to their house the next night. I had never been in such a nice house. Clearly their parents were a little uncomfortable with me there, Isobel kept calling me her brother, and you could see it made them cringe a bit. Max picked up on their discomfort too and quickly ushered us up to his room. There the three of us talked all night quietly about what we remembered, how Izzy was able to get into people’s heads, how my telekinesis worked (or didn’t), and how Max made weird things happen with electricity. I had the proud moment of the first time I corrupted the perfect Evans Twins when I pulled out a bottle of nail polish remover and showed them how we could get drunk.

“This is funny! It’s like when Daddy had too much champagne at that Christmas party, remember Max?”

Max giggled, which was funny in and of itself, “Yeah, he was funny when he was drunk! Michael, you should have seen it!”

“No thanks, I’ve seen drunk grown ups plenty, they are anything but funny!”

Talk about a way to kill the mood and a good buzz. Awkward silence fell over the room again and I knew I messed up. Hoping to not ruin the night and be sent home, I held up the bottle.

“Never mind that, here’s to us being funny!”

Isobel laughed again, “And here’s to us finding you Michael. Here’s to you coming back!”

For the first time, I slept really well in the sleeping bag on Max’s floor. There were no nightmares of fists, bubble gum pink nails clawing at me, screaming voices. And none of that happened in real life either, waking me up. I slept through the night, feeling a little less alone.


	4. After the Andersons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Michael leaves the Andersons, but meets Sheriff Jim Valenti and comes full circle

As the school year continued on, I found myself filled with very conflicting emotions, many of which were new to me. I had a growing loyalty to Max and Isobel. I felt like I belonged somewhere when I was with them. At the same time, I felt like it was one-sided. If we hadn’t all come out of.. wherever we came from, there was nothing connecting me to them, they wouldn’t have a second thought towards me. This angered me, mostly at myself, because they were starting to mean so much to me, I knew it was going to eventually hurt me. The tiniest bit of hope, of family, of belonging was enough to really do some damage to me, and the Evans twins had no idea the power they held over me. Isobel never followed through on her dad’s instruction of asking permission to hug me, and would hug me every time we saw each other at school. I slowly got used to her contact, secretly was happy when she would – it made me feel like I mattered, like I existed to someone. Max would occasionally put his hand on my shoulder or something like that. I had seen his dad to those gestures to him, and clearly Max was modeling after his father. 

Added to these conflicting feelings were the rules upon rules of living in the group home under the supervising eyes of the Anderson. The early morning sermons after nights of restless sleep grated on my nerves. The all day Sunday at their stupid church made it harder to be with Max and Izzy on the weekends. I had started sneaking out at night, walking randomly in directions trying to discover that feeling I had in the car when I returned to Roswell – that pull I had felt driving through the desert. Hanging out with Max and Izzy, or going to the library after school, hell even just going for a walk to clear my head was so much work – asking permission, answering questions before and after, being doubted or accused of getting up to “unholy activities” – it was all getting to be too much. But this was my life as the first year stretched into the next. 

It was the summer when we were 13 when I had narrowed the feeling in my stomach to Foster Ranch – I would go there at night and wander around, playing what felt like a game of picking a direction and seeing if the feeling got stronger or weaker. Other nights I’d just lay out in the open and watch the stars and the sky until the pull of sleep would make me go back to the group home. This became my second sanctuary after the library. I had gotten a topographical map of the area that included Foster Ranch and had started a grid hunt at night – something I had read about in a book. Another year stretched by. My anger stayed, my tk releases stayed, my loneliness stayed. But because I didn’t want to risk being taken away from Max and Izzy, I tried my best to follow the rules, stay out of trouble, in the hopes that I, too, could stay.

The day I came home with a couple library books in my arms, only to be accused of not being at the library as I said I was – someone from the Anderson’s church saw some kids by the Crashdown Café kicking some garbage bins over in the back alley and they assumed I was involved – it started to add more anger and stress to my already chaotic life. I don’t know exactly what happened, I felt this rage build up in me (a familiar experience for me) and I just remember putting my books down on the table – the books from the freakin’ library! – when they were scattered across the room as I tried in vain to explain that I was nowhere near the Crashdown.

The Andersons suddenly were very cold and distant to me, let me go up to my room to do my homework instead of at the table where they made everyone do it every afternoon. They didn’t even make me join evening sermon. The other kids wouldn’t make eye contact with me. It didn’t raise any warning signs with me, and my own stupidity might have been my downfall. I came down to dinner that evening and the priest from the church had joined us for dinner. This wasn’t the first time he had, so I didn’t think anything of it. After dessert (another warning sign I should have picked up on – we never had dessert) the other foster kids suddenly disappeared and I was kept at the table with the Andersons and the priest. Questions about the books moving came up – I panicked and clamped my mouth shut. While the three of us still didn’t know what we were or where we came from, we knew we were different and we knew no one could know. My lack of answer was clearly the wrong answer. The priest started asking about my past foster homes. The Andersons had clearly seen some of my file, they talked about Stacy and Kevin and suspected drug use. When all eyes turned to me, I knew I needed to say something, the silence of earlier clearly being the wrong answer. I skirted details but confirmed for them that they were drug addicts. When they asked about Chuck and Kim, I confirmed their love of alcohol. When the priest asked if Kim had ever been “friendly” with me, I looked confused. He kept pressing, asking if Kim and I had “unholy relations.” I had no idea what he was talking about, but had a guess after Mrs. Anderson said she heard me scream out from a nightmare once something about pink nail polish. I finally said Kim liked to cuddle, if anything just to shut them up. The priest nodded like suddenly everything made sense to him. They all stood up and asked me to follow them into the living room where the furniture had been pushed back to the walls and a chair was in the middle of the room. They made me sit down in the chair where the priest tied me to it. I started to panic. When Kim would trap me in the corner of the room on the mattress to touch me, that was nothing compared to the panic and fear when I was tied to a chair, unable to move. They all started praying, ignoring my panic, which only made my panic worse. Mr. Anderson brought out a belt, that the priest used to hit me on the back of my shoulders with that were exposed on either side of the back of the chair. The panic took over my body once the first hit of the belt was felt. With the second hit a vase on the table flew across the room and shattered against the opposite wall. The priest continued to hit me with the belt, pray and chant, occasionally flicking holy water on me. Nothing stopped the panic, and with the anger and panic, my tk was out of control and things kept moving, tables floating and dropping.

I don’t know how long this went on, but after what felt like eternity, they released one of my arms, only for the priest to take a candle and hold a metal ring to the flame before pressing into my arm, over and over again. I almost passed out from the pain. The last burn he set to my arm he held longer than the others, and with my final scream, everything that had been floating in the room suddenly dropped to the ground. My head fell forward, I was barely aware of what the Andersons and priest were doing. They said a final prayer, and walked out of the room. I was left, tied to the chair, burned arm in my lap, and wasn’t released until late the next afternoon. Saturday afternoon sermon was held as if nothing had happened. The rest of the weekend moved forward as if nothing had happened. Just like my other foster placements, I knew I wasn’t to speak of anything. But what I also promised myself after that, my tk was never going to be seen by anyone aside from the three of us. Aside from being unloved and unwanted, something was clearly wrong with me – I was wrong. I was still angry though. And my anger towards the Andersons was growing by the day. I wanted to tell my caseworker what happened, but at the same time, I was terrified he would take me somewhere else. Somewhere that wasn’t Roswell. I had only just found Max and Isobel, I couldn’t risk losing them again. I’d take whatever this world would put to me as long as I could keep Max and Izzy with me.  
The week at school went by, and the weekend was soon upon us. Our “birthday” weekend. Before Roswell, I had no idea what a birthday was, it had never been acknowledged or celebrated in any of my previous placements. My birthdays with the Evans was a new experience for me. Max had to explain what birthday parties were. Dinner was on fancy plates at the Evans, and when Isobel slipped the first year and said it was my birthday too, I could see Mrs. Evans get even more uncomfortable than she already seemed to be anytime I was in the same room. The twins had always taken turns picking what to do for their birthday, and the first year Izzy choosing to go mini-golfing (a “family” experience I had never felt so alien being a part of with their parents), The next year Max had chosen bowling and a sleepover at his house. This year, the Evans twins had asked the Andersons weeks prior if I could join them for their birthday party. I think to keep suspicion from them and the exorcism the week prior, they didn’t back out of their agreeing to let me spend the weekend with the Evans. Max and Izzy told me it was my turn to chose what we did for our birthday – mini-golf, go-karting, movie night at the Evans – anything I wanted. I told the I wanted to sleep out in the dessert with them under the stars.  
After another awkward dinner and cake with the Evans adults, the three of us took a tent and some sleeping bags and hiked out into Foster Ranch where they had been a few times, but by this time I was getting very familiar with. 

My nightly escapes were more frequent than not, and in the last couple years, I had scoured much of the terrain in my grid search. Max slowly grew more brave and would occasionally join me. Izzy joined us sometimes too. They couldn’t understand why I chose to spend my nights walking in the dessert, or lying on the sand looking at stars – Izzy said her bed was more comfortable. They couldn’t understand the peace I felt when I didn’t have four walls closing in on me, when I didn’t feel like a freak. When the stars brought a sense of remembering to me. How a cold breeze in the air could be countered by the residual warmth of the sand that had baked in the sun all day, warm sand that tugged at a memory of warm sand around naked feet.  
We set up a tent and started telling cheesy ghost stories. Isobel mentioned that there was a party that night. Max reminded her that it was my choice of what to do that night. I felt conflicted – happy Max was sticking up for me, guilty for taking Isobel away from what she wanted to do. She went to go pee.

As we had been getting to know each other, Max always asked questions, trying to find out what life for me was like. He would ask about the houses, or the people, the schools, if I had any friends in the earlier placements. He would ask if I had ever been hurt in any of them. Once when I snuck into his room to sleep one night I saw him on the internet, googling signs of child abuse. That night when he saw me, he quickly closed the screen, but looked at me with this knowing look, one that was quickly followed by a look of pity – something I always hated to see on teachers, caseworkers, and now I was seeing it from Max. I would see it in the future, and never liked it any more than I had the first time I saw it. I usually deflected, steered Max away from his questions. But sometimes I’d throw him a hard truth, a shock to his reality – a brief answer, a brutal truth. It would shut him up for a while. He would avoid eye contact for a day or so, and would stop asking questions for a while. I felt a bit guilty when I would do that to him, but at the same time, he should figure out to not ask what he really doesn’t want to know.  
Tonight’s brutal truth to Max was showing him my arm from the exorcism. I cut him off from asking any questions by rolling my sleeve back down, saying I didn’t want to talk about it, and was cut off myself by Izzy’s scream. What I remember the most from that fateful night in the desert was how, in that moment, I felt as innocent and helpless as Max and Izzy. I knew the evil in the world, what it could do, and yet in the face of it, I froze as much as they did. When Max put his hand on the guy and somehow killed him, even I hadn’t done something that bad before. But I also knew it was another secret, another thing that could get all of us taken away, sent to different places. That was when we stopped feeling just different, and knew that whatever we were, if people knew what Max did to that guy, we would end up dead too. So I channeled that fear, all my anger, and a good bit of panic, and used my tk to bury the guy. Because while I was unlovable and worthless, I’d be damned if I was going to let anything happen to Max or Izzy. We all kind of grew up a bit that night, and not from a stupid birthday. We all also kind of broke a bit that night – the first crack in the pleasant world the Evans twins lived in, and yet another in what was already a very precariously crumbling foundation of trust for me.

After that night, I slept even less than before – when I would close my eyes, all I could see was that guy’s face, the knife, a terrified Isobel, and a shocked Max starting at his hands. I would wake up unable to breathe, feeling like the sand was suffocating me instead of that guy. I would sneak out almost nightly. I was also terrified of the Andersons – after the exorcism, I was afraid they would be able to tell that something had happened in the desert. I didn’t want to go through another one. After a couple weeks of little to no sleep, doing everything I could to minimize my contact with the Andersons, I was pulled aside in the hallway at school by Sophia.

“They’re bringing that priest back this weekend, Michael. They think you’re still possessed and that you’re full of new sins or some bullshit. You need to get out of there. There was this older kid when I first got placed there that they did the same thing to. The second exorcism – he ended up in the hospital.”

“Are you serious?! I can’t go through that again.”

“I know, that’s why I’m telling you. Your caseworker won’t believe you, so don’t bother calling him. Your only choice is to take it or run.” The bell rang and she walked off without another word.

That night, I packed what little I owned in my backpack and crawled out the window for the last time from the longest placement I had. Foster Ranch backed up to the turquoise mines out in the desert. The older kids would talk about the caves near the mines, places to party or get away from crap at home. I had found a couple of them over the last year, and knew I could lie low for a bit while I figured out what to do next. I trekked out to the caves, and started going into each one, trying to find one that was enclosed enough to keep the night chill out, not show a light if I started a small fire while still ventilating, and one that no one else seemed to be using for parties so I wouldn’t be discovered. After a couple possible options, I saw the top of a cave opening down a slight slope with no beaten path towards it. As soon as I got halfway to the opening, that feeling I had been chasing for a couple years suddenly hit me strong. I carefully continued into the mouth of the opening, trying to quell the butterflies in my stomach, the feeling so strong it was almost making me dizzy. I walked deep into the cave and went around a bend, and suddenly felt myself washed in a warm light that I had almost completely forgotten about. I fell to my knees, tears suddenly streaming down my face. I hadn’t cried in years if you didn’t count the tears I shed during the exorcism. Sitting in front of me, the three pods that had protected us all those years. I stood back up and slowly approached them. The one on the left tugged at me more than the other two, it was like I knew it was mine. I slowly approached it, bathing in the warmth of the light, and the warmth that filled my body. Hand shaking, I slowly reached out and put my hand on the pod. Immediately my mind was filled with images of space, stars flying past, a crash of a ship, a warm glow, and then slowly climbing out of the pod and taking Isobel’s hand. I quickly pulled my hand away, looked at my palm, then the pod. I remembered something! When I tentatively touched the pod again, no flashes came, and the warmth was a little less, but it was still there. I sat down next to my pod and fell into a peace I haven’t experienced on this planet. I don’t know when I finally fell asleep, but it was without dreams of pain, abuse, death. It was peaceful, restful, filled with starry skies.

The next day I crept out of the cave and made my way back through Foster Ranch. A couple of the ranch hands had seen me around enough to not bother taking notice of my frequent appearances – but the foreman had never seen me much during the daytime hours, and when he pulled his truck up near me as I walked, he offered a ride back to the front gate. As he dropped me off at the gate, he gave me a knowing look, “make sure if you’re skipping school you stay low until after the day ends, and don’t bring trouble here, got it?” I nodded my thanks and continued my way into town, desperate to find Max and Izzy.

True to my word to the ranch hand, I stayed hidden until school let out. Turns out when no one pays much attention to you in the first place, you can actually get away with quite a bit without anyone noticing. I hung out at the edge of the park near the Evanses, sitting in the play structure where we first got to know each other years before. I pulled out a library book and read while waiting for the school day to end. When Max and Izzy finally walked across the park towards home, I jumped out and ran to meet them.

“Michael, where were you today? We couldn’t find you at school.” Izzy looked concerned and Max nodded.

I waved them off, “I’ll explain later. First you guys have to come with me. I found something crazy important to all of us out by the mines last night.”

They looked at each other and Max nodded, “OK, we have to go home first and drop our stuff off so our mom doesn’t worry.”

We headed back to their house, and I waited around the side of their house while they went in, afraid of being seen by either Evans adult. A couple minutes later, Max and Izzy reappeared. Izzy kept her complaining to a minimum as we hiked through Foster Ranch and towards the mines and the cave. Suddenly teenage Isobel was all about shoes, and to her, fashion overrode practicality of desert hiking. Max started to get a bit nervous as we approached where all the caves were.

“Michael, where are you taking us? Our parents don’t want us going near these caves, its where the high school kids get into trouble.”

Isobel rolled her eyes before I could, ”Oh give it a rest Max. We are at the high school next year, its not like we’re kids anymore. Besides, I heard half of what people say happens here is all bullshit anyways.” 

“Both of you chill, we’re almost there.”

We climbed up the knoll where the top of the cave could be seen below. They followed me down and into the cave. When we came around the bend inside and the glow of the pods came into view, both Max and Isobel gasped.

“Michael! You found them!” Isobel walked straight to the middle one, holding her hand a bit away from her pod, like she was afraid to touch it. Max hung back a bit more, was slower to approach his pod.

“When I touched mine last night, I got like, flashes or something, and suddenly could remember a little bit of before.”

Max looked at me startled at that confession, then stepped up to his pod. At almost the same time, Max and Izzy put their hands on the pods, and immediately you could see they were having the same flashes I had the night before. A few seconds later, they both gasped and staggered backwards a couple steps. I nodded in encouragement, as I knew exactly what had just happened.

Izzy stared at the pods, “The crash. We came here in the crash. How is that possible? That was so long ago!”

Max nodded, “I don’t know, but it explains everything. Why we are different. But it also means we were right. We really can’t tell anyone.”

We stayed in the cave, sitting near our pods, wrapped in their warmth for hours. When Max’s alarm went off on his phone, he jumped up.

“Crap, we’re going to be late for dinner. Izzy let’s go.”

We got up and headed out of the cave. As we hiked back to town and their house, Izzy asked if I was going to get in trouble as I always had to be back at the group home before they had to be home for dinner.

“Nah, I left there yesterday. Sophia told me they didn’t think the first exorcism worked and were going to do another one this weekend. I took off last night.” 

Izzy looked confused, “What exorcism?” Clearly Max hadn’t told her. He was probably afraid to talk to Izzy about any part of that night, and I couldn’t blame him.

Max looked concerned, “Where are you going to stay? Won’t you get in trouble when they figure out you’re gone?”

I shrugged, “I’ll deal with that when I have to. I just know I can’t stay there anymore. I figured I’d take a couple days, figure things out, then I don’t know… call my case worker or something.”

“Well, in the meantime, come back with us. You can hide up in my room and I’ll bring dinner up to you afterwards. You can take a shower and stay the night.”

By this point, Max’s floor and sleeping bag had become my second bed, and I was grateful for that patch of floor. I nodded in agreement and we headed to their house. The evening went by without any drama, Max somehow knowing not to push too hard for more info about my running away. The next morning as Max and Izzy headed to school, I headed back to the cave. I had a good place to hide out now, a peace that came with the location, and something that felt a little like what people said home was. It was after dark outside when I heard someone approaching the cave. I held my breath until Max came into view.

“Michael, here you are.”

“Max, what’s up?”

“The vice principle pulled me out of last period today to ask about you. He said the Andersons reported you missing this morning. The sheriff was with Mr. Thompkins when he pulled me out of class. They’re looking for you.”

“You didn’t say anything did you?”

“Of course not, but what are you going to do?”

What a good question. I knew I couldn’t hide forever. But I couldn’t go back to the group home or the Andersons. I know it didn’t make a lot of sense, but the last couple years of psychological games, sin and religion, corporal punishment in the name of “saving” me, the exorcism not withstanding… Give me addicts and drunks any day over the Andersons. At least with addicts, they hit you or yell at you and it’s done until the next time. I already knew I wasn’t wanted, wasn’t worth anymore than the checks the state sent to take care of me. But that was a lot more black and white – easier to navigate. With the Andersons, their freaky religion slant meant you never knew where things were going to come from, what angle you had to play. Frankly, it was exhausting and I was done. I just needed enough time to figure out how to make sure I stayed in Roswell once I finally got turned in or caught. After years of messing up and being sent away, this was the first time I tried to have any control over the situation – I left first. The question was what the fall out would be.

A couple days later, I snuck out of Max’s bedroom window after they went to school, planning to hide out in the rows of books at the library until school let out. I had just come around the corner of the building, the doors to the library just ahead when I accidently ran into someone who was coming the opposite direction around that corner. Books dropped to the sidewalk, and as I mumbled an apology, the person who kneeled down to pick up books made me freeze and my heart stop.

Sheriff Valenti. Oh shit.

“Mr. Guerin! Imagine running into you here this morning. In front of the library. During school hours. You know, funny enough, I’ve spent the last couple days looking for you. And here you are!”

We both stood slowly and I started trying to subtly look around for an easy exit. The heavy hand grasping my shoulder told me there were no options. I flinched at the contact. The Sheriff definitely clocked the flinch. He escorted me to his patrol car, and we headed to the station. I was surprised when he pulled up to the Crashdown on the way to the station. He told me to stay put, reminded me that I couldn’t open the back doors from the inside, and that he would be right back. He locked the car and jogged into the café. Part of me wanted to use my powers to pop open the doors (I had gotten pretty good at locks the last couple years of sneaking out of the group home) but a bigger part of me knew I was already in trouble, and the last thing we needed was for a sheriff to start to try to figure out how a kid got out of a locked police car. Valenti reappeared quickly, a couple take away bags under his arms. He put them on the passenger seat and continued to the station. After very few meals the last week, the food in the bags both made my stomach grumble in hunger, while also causing a small bout of nausea from not eating frequently. Both reactions Valenti clocked – I knew I had to be subtle with this guy.

We got to the station, and headed to his office. Part of me was surprised – I figured I’d be in cuffs, or thrown in a cell to make sure I didn’t run again. Instead I was offered a chair in his office and one of the bags of food. I peered inside the bag – breakfast burritos and hash. I tried to eat slowly, not make it look like I wanted or needed the food. After eating both burritos and the hash, the sheriff set the bit of his first burrito aside and looked at me.

“Now son, we can do this a couple different ways. I’ve seen your file, what is in there as well as what I suspect is not in there.” He paused and looked at me. I schooled my neutral face – like I would talk to this guy! 

“I’ve also seen your school file, and know that you are a smart kid. My son, Kyle, could probably learn a thing or two from you in that department!” That stupid pause again. I kept the stone face, walls firmly in place. I knew Kyle from school – he used to be nicer to people, but this year he had started to be a bit of a jerk to Max and others, but I wasn’t about to say that to his dad.

Sheriff Valenti sighed, “I also know what I have heard over the years about that group home you have been in. Nothing anyone will say on the record, and nothing I can prove, but enough that if what I have heard over the years is why you chose to run away… let’s just say I might understand why.”

If he thought I was smart from my school records, he was really a big moron if he thought an opening like that was suddenly going to have me talking. Instead I eyed the bag of his food, then back to him. He chuckled a bit and slid the bag to me, giving me his second burrito and hash that he hadn’t eaten. I took my time again eating, mulling over my options and what approach to take.

“Have you called my case worker?”

He shook his head, “Tried to, left a voicemail.”

I scoffed, “Yeah, that means he’ll get back to you next week at the earliest.”

He nodded, “Yeah, sadly I think I’m inclined to agree with you.”

I continued to eat for another minute.

“Can I ask you something?”

He nodded, looking at me over enthusiastically, like I was about to spill everything for him. Idiot.

“I can’t go back to the Andersons. But can my next placement be in Roswell? I’ll do… I’ll go wher…. I just want to stay in Roswell.” I tentatively glanced up to look at Sheriff Valenti, hoping that maybe once, something goes right for me.

Valenti took a deep breath and sat back. “Can I ask what’s so important here in Roswell?”

I sat back and crossed my arms. I wasn’t stupid. The minute you show anything – you care about something, a want, a need, a weakness – it will not only get taken away from you, but it will hurt when they take it.

“Will you tell me what happened that made you run away?”

I took the bag of food and pulled out his hash, starting to eat it rather than say anything. He watched me for a couple minutes.

“You know son – “

“I’m not your son.”

He chuckled at that, “You’re right. Funny, I was about to say that you remind me of another kid your age I know. He’s going through some stuff at home, won’t tell me much, but after watching you kids grow up, you see through silence. You already remind me of that kid, and when I called him son the other day, he said the exact thing back to me.”

I kept the stone face – I wasn’t going to fall for some line of understanding me because of some other kid. If there even was some other kid. Their problems are their problems, not mine. I have enough of my own.

Jim shook his head and pushed his chair back. “Stay here and finish eating. I’m going to get a bottle of water and check something out.” I heard the door lock after he exited.

After a bit of time, he came back in, handing me a bottle of water and sat back down, a file folder in his hands.

“You were one of those kids found in the desert about eight years ago, weren’t you?”

I glanced at him, then looked towards the window. I didn’t know where this question was going.

“The other two kids, Max and Isobel Evans, they were found with you, wasn’t that right? It must have been hard for you when you were placed up north while they stayed here. Kyle tells me you are almost always with them at school.”

Stay strong. Stone wall. Don’t show you care. “So?”

Valenti closed the file, “So, one might think that might be a reason you’d want to stay in Roswell. To stay close to your fa—close to the Evans twins.” He fished for eye contact. I finally glanced back to him briefly before looking down.

“It is OK to want to stay close to them. It’s OK to say that’s why you want to be placed in Roswell.”

“Like it matters. Like anyone is going to listen to some kid.”

“Listen to some kid, huh? Yeah, I imagine not many have listened to you over the years, huh? What’s the point of saying anything if no one listens?”

“Is there a point to this?”

“Yes Mr. Guerin, the point I’m trying to make is that I am trying to listen, I’d like to know what you have to say. About the Andersons, what goes on in that group home, why you want to stay in Roswell, and that you do, in fact, care about the Evans twins despite your best efforts to look like you don’t care about anything at all.”

I looked back out the window.

“I can’t help you if you don’t say anything.”

“If I say why I don’t want to go back to the Andersons, do you promise to help me stay in Roswell?”

Jim takes another deep breath.

“You have my word Mr. Guerin.”

I stare him down for a good ten seconds, looking for any sign of a bluff. I don’t trust cops. I don’t trust case workers. I don’t trust the system. Hell, I don’t trust myself. But just like I would throw a hard truth to Max sometimes to shut him up, I wonder if throwing something to Valenti will blow up in my face or not. But to be honest, I have nothing to lose. I’m going to be taken away regardless – I screwed up again.

I pull my sleeve up on my left arm. While most of the burns have healed, some are still scabbed over, and the ones that have healed are bright pink new scars – the haphazard cross still clearly visible. I rotate my arm around to show Valenti, who immediately breathes in audibly before trying to not outwardly react.

“Why did they do that to you son—Michael?” 

I pull my sleeve back down, “Can I stay in Roswell? Please?”

“Michael, I told you already I would do what I can to make that happen. Why did they do that?”

“To rid me of my sin and the devil. Can I use the bathroom?”

Clearly seeing I gave as much away as I was going to, he nodded, rising to escort me to the bathrooms down the hall. When I returned, he took a picture of my arm, left another message with my case worker, then called a contact he had at CPS. A couple hours later I was met with a woman who clearly knew the sheriff. She escorted me to her car and took me to a group home on the edge of town that looked oddly familiar. Wouldn’t you know, I came full circle back to the orphanage where our contact with humans had started all those years before.  
“You’ll stay here for a couple days while we line up your next placement.”

“It’ll be here in Roswell, right? The sheriff promised.”

She nodded, “We will see what we can do. He shouldn’t be making promises he can guarantee he can keep.” She could see me about to protest and held her hand up.

“Jim explained the situation, and I can tell you that I will do all I can to try to place you in Roswell. But you’re almost 15, it’s a hard age range to place, and that’s before your—”

“File, yeah. I know. Apparently I’m the problem in the problem case.”

She sighed and I just shook my head and climbed out of the car, walking into the orphanage where my hell started. Alone. Unwanted. Unworthy. And now exactly back at square one.


	5. From Placements to Freedom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A couple more placements and the birth of the truck

I will say, I was surprised when my placement came through a week later, and in Roswell. Maybe Sheriff Jim Valenti wasn’t completely useless after all. I briefly thought if there was some other kid he was helping I reminded him of, maybe that kid had a chance too.

To say the rundown house I landed at was the worst yet would be an understatement. But I had already learned that whatever hell you left, the next place will always be worse. But it wasn’t fundamental religious freaks, so I wasn’t about to complain. The lady who lived there, Tina, was a chain-smoking drunk who worked at the cheese factory. The rotating door of men she would bring home were more of the challenge to deal with. Some were hot heads who liked to look tough slapping around a kid half their size. Some were happy to just make you feel small to make them feel big – yelling slurs and insults about how worthless I was. If I hadn’t already dealt most of my life with it all, it might have been funny how little affect they had on me. The damage had already been done. The problem I had with this placement was when there weren’t any men over for the night. Tina didn’t like to sleep alone. And she was a lot more pushy than Kim had been way back when. Add to that the hormones of a 15 year old boy, and I hated myself more when my body would react despite my not wanting it to. Tina took my erections as a sign that I was enjoying myself as much as she was. I was her play thing. I learned more in that six months with her than I had in all my years of watching teens and kids fumble around at school learning about sex. I learned what made Tina happy. I learned that if you just gave it to her, she’d leave you alone sooner. I learned that Tina used sex to forget her pain, to make the noise in her head go away. I could relate to that. I had started spending my free period at school in the music room where some guitars would always be left out. I had taught myself some chords and had figured out that music helped quiet the noise in my head. I also learned that girls at school wanted to feel good like Tina did, and I suddenly knew what to do to make them happy. At least with some of the girls at school I didn’t feel as dirty afterwards. I still felt like a toy everyone was using, but at least when I was picking up a girl at school, I was choosing who it was, I was in a little bit of control. After the first couple months though, even messing around with girls at school didn’t help – I wouldn’t see them, I’d see Tina.

I started spending nights sleeping in the cave with the pods. But I was careful. I knew the sheriff had his eye on me. He thought we had bonded or some random shit. I could disappear for a night, but had to make sure I turned up to school everyday. I also had to make sure Tina didn’t think I had run away. My 15th birthday was spent having lunch with Max and Izzy at the Crashdown before being stuck at Tina’s with her guy of the week getting drunk on the couch. The fact that there was a guy who wasn’t a complete prick and didn’t want to hit me around and was going to take of Tina that night – best birthday present ever. I also had gotten myself a part time job at the junkyard. Mr. Sanders said he had a soft spot for hard cases, something about understanding where they came from. Whatever, I just wanted a job. I started sorted scrap metal and stuff. But when I found most of the pieces to an old motor for a truck, Mr. Sanders said I could work on it on my own time if I wanted. I checked out a bunch of books from the library about cars and motors. I would scour the junkyard for parts, take other trucks apart to find what I needed. When the body of most of an old Chevy truck came in one day, Sanders pulled it aside for me. Between playing guitar and working on the motor, I found that I could quiet the storm in my head a bit. I found an outlet to all my anger and frustration. And the beauty of the junkyard was that when my tk did go out of control, you’d never know and no one was around.

I got good at motors, and Sanders started giving me side jobs changing oil or doing simple repairs to cars. It was great – I’d work on a car, fixing something, and then using that knowledge to get my truck motor to the next step. In my hunt for pieces, I came across a bunker that was under the junkyard. Some old fallout shelter from back when they did atom bomb tests back in WW2. I snuck into the junkyard one night and used my tk to move the body of the truck I was working on over the hatch. I got the fans in it working, and had started pulling wire from around the yard to get lights working in it. It was another hiding place for me closer to town than the pod chamber. I’d still go exploring around Foster Ranch at night – up in the hills where the crash had apparently happened, I started finding small pieces of glass. The weird part was that when you touched them, they would shimmer, come alive. The bunker in the junkyard became my hiding place for the pieces I would find.

Six months into my placement with Tina, I was almost as relieved as I had been leaving the Andersons when she announced one day that she got fired and was leaving town for a new gig in Las Cruses. She at least paid me the respect of driving me to the sheriff’s station when she left. I don’t think my car door was closed all the way before she peeled out. I slung my backpack over my shoulder and walked to the Crashdown – Valenti wasn’t going anywhere. I figured I’d get a burger and fires before dealing with the reality that was my shitty existence. And since getting the job at Sander’s, I had money for the first time. I could go to the Crashdown and not rely on Max or Isobel to pay for me. I was halfway through my meal when Sheriff Valenti slid into the booth across from me.

“Mr. Guerin, I hear you got dropped at my station this afternoon.”

I rolled my eyes. “Can I at least finish eating in peace before we hash this out? Besides, isn’t this my case worker’s problem, not yours? I’m sure Wayne will screw it up just fine without your help.”

Valenti chuckled, “Yes, I imagine he will – if he ever answers his phone.”

Just then, Max and Isobel came into the café and were halfway to me when they froze in their tracks at the sight of the sheriff sitting with me. Valenti saw them and started to slide out of the booth.

“Tell you what Mr. Guerin, I’m going to assume that you are staying with the Evans tonight while I track Wayne down and get him started on your next placement. I want you in my office right after school tomorrow, am I understood? I’m trusting you on this one.”

I nodded, unable to vocalise my thanks. He tipped his hat to Isobel as he walked out of the café. She and Max slide into the booth the sheriff just vacated.

“What does he want from you, Michael? What’s going on?”

I shake my head, “Nothing, it’s fine. Hey can I crash at yours tonight?”

Izzy rolls her eyes, ”Like you have to ask. Of course.”

I ask Max about the book we are reading in English Lit, knowing that I won’t have to say anything for at least a good hour, taking the focus off of me. They order food, and even though I am done eating, I lean back and let Max drone on about Ethan Frome or something. Arturo brings their food, and slides a milkshake in front of me with a wink and smirk. The prideful side of me hates when he does this – like I’m some charity case that he pities. The other side of me likes it a bit – like someone sees me. I do wonder what he wants in return- nothing is free and over the years, between extra fries and free milkshakes, I don’t want to know what my tab is and what he will eventually want in return. But I’m also not an idiot, and food is food, and when you don’t know when your next meal might be, you eat (or drink) what is put in front of you.

__

After school the next day, I go to the sheriff’s station, as promised. Valenti meets me out front and walks me in where, surprisingly, Wayne is sitting in his office waiting for me. I hadn’t actually seen my case worker since being placed with the Andersons, as Valenti’s contact placed me with Tina. Part of me took a bit of smug satisfaction when Valenti pointed this fact out to Wayne, letting him know his absence didn’t go unnoticed. Valenti was still a dick, but at that moment, he had a leg up on the prick named Wayne. Wayne asked where my stuff was, and was a bit embarrassed when I held out my school bag and Valenti shot him a look of “Really?” at the boneheaded question. I followed Wayne out to his car. He drove me ten minutes to the edge of town where a trailer park sat along the road. Here I met Hank. Hank worked at the factory where Tina worked. Part of me wondered if they knew each other – they were each other’s type. Not that I was about to ask. 

My place with Hank was established quickly after Wayne’s departure. I was to do the cooking and cleaning. I wasn’t to drink his booze. I was to do the laundry. I was being kept for the monthly check and there should never be a question of it being anything more. I was shown to a small room at the end of the trailer where a camping cot was set up. About 20 minutes later, the shout that would become familiar rang out through the trailer demanding dinner. This was now my life. But the cot only could fit one, and there was a door with a lock, so at least my sleeping arrangements had improved from Tina.

The new routine of living with Hank established itself fairly quickly. He mostly ignored me, more bark than bite. As long as some kind of food appeared in the evenings, and the laundry got done, I mostly could do what I wanted. I could come and go freely, stay out as late as I wanted. It was believing it was because I could take care of myself, not because he literally didn’t give a shit about me. Even when he was drunk enough to get in my face and hit me, it was usually minor (especially compared to some of my earlier placements) and I could get out of the trailer and into the night air without too much hassle. I even tuned out most of the verbal abuse hurled at me on a nightly basis. If you already think you’re worthless, what more can be said to make you feel worse, especially from someone as useless as Hank. 

School was still a small saving grace for me. I enjoyed the science and math classes, loved every morning when Izzy would come to my locker first thing and give me a big hug. I would use my free period and sneak into the music room, play on one of the guitars in the room until someone would come and I’d sneak out before I could get kicked out. After school I’d head to Sander’s and work on my truck, or someone else’s truck, or sort whatever Sander’s said needed sorting. I’d stop by the library on my way to the trailer park and then head in, ready for whatever was on the other side. Hank was a lot like Chuck. You could gauge how the evening would go down based on how many beers he had consumed on his way home from work. The dangerous nights were when he had finished the six pack before the front door and was into the whiskey. On more than one occasion, whiskey nights meant googling what a broken rib felt like the next day, or trying to keep the limp as subtle as possible if he got a good kick in when I was down.

I was a couple months past sixteen when I finally had enough. Sanders helped me get my license, and I had finally gotten the beat up Chevy running. Sanders said he was proud of me, that the motor sounded great. We laid out a couple ideas of ways I could then improve what was under the hood of the truck to keep it running for years. I had gone back to the trailer one evening. Hank had gotten there before me. This was a rarity. Despite my avoidance of placements and nighttime wanderings, Hank’s included, I knew the importance of when you should be at one, and when you shouldn’t. Whether it was being at the group home in time for sermon to avoid the latest form of corporal punishment under the guise of “saving my soul” or being inside ready to see how many beers were on the rings as it was with Chuck and now Hank, sometimes you needed to be somewhere to know when you needed to disappear, make a subtle exit. This one evening, I failed in that very requirement. Hank was already in his recliner, hugging his whiskey bottle between swigs – never a good sign.

“Where the hell’va been? I got home and there was no supper!”

I tried to placate – sometimes with Hank it got you freed with nothing more than a punch to the gut or a slap upside the head.

“Sorry, I was at the library. I’ll get something made.”

“Fucking library, what do you think? You’re going to go off to some fancy college or something? Who would want you at a place like that?! And how do you think you’d pay for some fancy fucking college?! You’re a bigger idiot than I thought you were!”

I tried to ignore him as I swept through the cupboards in the kitchen looking for whatever I could throw together for some form of dinner for us. I found a packet of French onion soup flavoring, half a bag of pasta, and some milk that smelled like it might be good for another half hour before turning sour. There was one piece of bacon at the back of the fridge. If there is one upside to growing up in the system, you learn to cook and you learn to be creative. Far too many of us would have starved otherwise. I boiled water for the pasta while pulling out a frying pan, warming up the milk and french onion soup with some water, then adding the bacon I had diced up to make it look like it was more than one piece. After reducing the liquid a bit, I poured the impromptu sauce over the pasta and split it between two plates. As long as you didn’t chew for too long, and swallowed it fast enough to not taste too much of it, it worked. It was at least solid calories, which was better than when I sometimes would have to sneak one of Hank’s beers away just to get something in my stomach other than water at the end of the month when the check for me had long run out.

“What kind of shit food is this?! It’s disgusting!”

“It’s all there was Hank. The next check comes next week and I can go to the grocery then.”

“I can’t eat this! Go to the store now!”

I tried to keep the growing panic out of my voice, keep it calm and quiet. “Hank, there’s no more money right now for groceries. I’ll go next week once the check comes.”

Hank dropped the plate of pasta on the floor and pulled himself out of the recliner. Oh shit.

“What about your money?! I know you have that job! Take your money and go get food! You’re always eating food from my money! I won’t stand for it!”

Before my temper could slip enough for the thought going through my head “Technically the state welfare check is to take care of me you moron”, Hank had swung as if to backhand me. Except I don’t think he realized he still had his precious whiskey in his hand. The bottle connected with my eye brow, and I immediately felt the blood run down my face from the gash. That sensation was immediately followed by the sting of the sloshed whiskey hitting the gash, making me fall back and recoil. Hank groaned, pissed off that his whiskey had spilt. I quickly backed out of the living area, headed back to the bedroom, slammed the door shut and tried to find something to put pressure on my eyebrow while also wiping the blood from my face. A couple minutes later Hank threw the door open, his body silhouetted in the crappy hall light behind him.

“Get back out there and clean up the dishes from that shit meal or so help me, I’ll throw your worthless ass out!”

“Throw me out?! How will that work for you then? You won’t get the monthly check that I come with!”

Hank lunged forward, holding his hand up, ready to strike. He saw me flinch, knew I was scared, and reveled in that power he held.

“That’s right, cower in that corner. Now clean up and then get out here and clean up!”

He slammed the door closed and I could hear him stomp back to the front of the trailer, falling back into his recliner. Something in me snapped. Fuck. This. Shit.

It’s funny. Kids in care, we know when our date is. Once you get close to that end date, you keep this subconscious running clock, like the ball at New Years Eve. I had one year, seven months, sixteen days til I was 18. In that time, I’d be free of the system, and completely on my own. It is both a liberating and terrifying time as all services end and you are as on your own as you can get, but you’re also free of whatever shit situation you were forced into by CPS. But at that moment, with one year, seven months, and sixteen days to go before aging out? Fuck. This. Shit. I was done.

I pulled out my backpack, tossed the couple shirts I had in it, the second pair of jeans, and grabbed my hoodie and jacket. I took the sleeping bag from atop the cot and climbed out the window of the last place I would ever be placed. I was aging myself out at that moment.

I took my stuff and walked towards the junkyard where my truck was parked. I pulled the keys out of my pocket and climbed into the cab of my truck. I could still feel the blood on the side of my face, but it was more sluggish, starting to clot. I put my bag and sleeping bag on the passenger side of the cab and then went over to the work area, finding some medical tape in the first aid kit to help close my eyebrow up. I then drove my truck over to Foster Ranch and out into the open desert. I put my sleeping bag out in the back of the truck and slept the first of many nights in the back of my truck in the desert, under the stars. I felt alone, and at the same time, in control for the first time. And I was just fine with that.


End file.
